Seems certain Black Ops 2 owners are having a strange issue when they attempt to install the second disc on PC. What started with a video from "zeroiez" showing himself inserting disc two of Black Ops 2 -- and then being prompted to install Mass Effect 2 instead -- has been confirmed as more than just a single freak occurence. Various posts found on the official Steam forums, Reddit, and Call of Duty forums are confirming the same problem.

Here's the original video:

Since this discovery, BioWare has posted an official response on their blog, teasingly referring to the mix-up as "an omen" pointing players to Mass Effect instead of Call of Duty. They've also promised to give away their upcoming Mass Effect trilogy to the first 50 people who can send in photographic evidence of their swapped disc to community@bioware.com. PC only, of course, since this issue is afflicting PC versions of Black Ops 2.

If the universe thinks that you should be playing Mass Effect right now, who are we to argue? In fact, we want to help! The first fifty fans affected by this phenomenon to send us a picture holding their special disc 2 will receive a code for a FREE PC copy of Mass Effect Trilogy.

Remember, in order to qualify, YOU must be in the picture, and disc 2 of your Call of Duty: Black Ops II must be visible.

So EA and BioWare are clearing having a field day with this. Activision, on the other hand, is probably considerably less amused.

Gamers on the Steam community forums, Reddit and the Call of Duty forums are reporting that when they try to install disc 2 of Call of Duty: Black Ops 2, they instead get Mass Effect 2. So that’s what Treyarch meant when they said they were adding moral choices to the campaign.

Early reports were confirmed when PCGamesN discovered a video by zeroiez (embedded above) showing him inserting a CoDBlOps2 disc into his machine before getting a prompt to install BioWare’s Mass Effect 2 instead.

Exactly how an EA game ended up in an Activision case is uncertain, but it’s possible the two publishing giants contract the same company to produce discs, and there was a disc image mixup at the factory. We’ve reached out to Activision for comment.

So far the error seems to have affected a relatively small number of people, but if you’re one of them your best bet is to use your CD key to download the game directly from Steam instead. I hope your internet is up to the task.

Meanwhile, we’ve got Martin hard at work playing the real Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 for our review. He’s just gotten to the bit where you meet Garrus.